Coffee with a Conscience Trinity’s Caterer Agrees to Serve Only Fair Trade Versions on Campus

By Susie P. Gonzalez

March 2009 – When Trinity needs a jolt of java, only
Fair Trade coffee will do.

The University’s campus caterer is now serving 100 percent
Fair Trade coffee, and lots of it – hundreds of gallons a week, in fact, says Miguel Ardid, director of Aramark’s
Trinity University Dining Services. The reason is simple, he adds: Students
wanted it, and it was the right thing to do.

A student leader of Trinity’s Fair Trade Coffee Council
calls this development “a huge step forward” because the accompanying system of certification ultimately helps farmers as
well as the environment. “Fair Trade consolidates most of the expensive steps
of coffee roasting and marketing into one Fair Trade Certified company,
allowing more money to go back to the original primary producers – farmers and
pickers, who receive less than 2 cents on the average $3 cup of coffee,” says senior Mica Segal of Houston, who is majoring in Spanish and communications
with a minor in international studies.

Fair
Trade certification also insures the farm is more environmentally and socially responsible
and encourages farmers to form co-operatives to exert their independence, Ms.
Segal says. Fair Trade coffee was already the buzz when the social
responsibility branch of the Trinity University Volunteer Action Community
(TUVAC) screened BlackGold, a documentary about Fair Trade
practices. But seeing how some coffee farmers were exploited, students ramped
up their lobbying, Ms. Segal says, adding that Trinity students would
like to extend Fair Trade campus purchases to almonds, bananas, cranberries,
chocolate, and sugar and to pursue the sale of sweatshop-free clothing at the
campus bookstore.

Mr.
Ardid says he’ll have to look into widening the list of Fair Trade commodities
and notes that it took three years for Fair Trade coffee to become affordable
for Aramark. Coffee, as with gasoline, has dropped in price, making the
exclusive sale of Fair Trade coffee possible at Java City, the Coates
University Center, and Mabee Dining Hall from a business standpoint. From an
environmental standpoint, he says Aramark embraced serving only Fair Trade products.
In addition, the President’s Task Force on Sustainability voted in 2008
to endorse 100 percent Fair Trade coffee on campus.

That’s good news to the Coffee Council. Ms. Segal says, “Coffee is an obvious favorite of
college students, and it's nice to see Trinity be able to do its part by
consuming conscientiously.”